TOWN Clerk Royston King has observed that it is difficult for the Mayor and City Council (M&CC) to strike a good balance in providing services to citizens and honouring financial obligations.This, he said, is due to the Council’s “very meagre resources.” However, King said he believes that the Council can overcome the challenges.

At Monday’s statutory meeting, King was speaking in the context of a delay in the payment of wages and salaries to City Hall workers.

According to him, a situation with Republic Bank had to be corrected before the workers could be paid. “We managed to correct the situation and our accounts have been settled at Republic Bank and as we speak, workers are receiving their salaries. We wish to thank workers for their support and understanding.”

“We continue to do works in the city, some monumental tasks, and we have to strike a good balance between fulfilling our mandate to local communities and the city as a whole and honoring our financial obligations to contractors and workers. It is not easy given our very meager resources but by God’s grace and support of this council, the understanding and patience of workers, I believe that we will overcome,” King continued.

In an invited comment yesterday, Mayor Patricia Chase-Green told this newspaper that she does not believe that the municipality is cash-strapped, even as it “overstretched” its budget to do clean-up works in time for the jubilee celebrations.

Just last Monday, People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) Councillor Bishram Kuppen told reporters on Monday that he is uneasy with the situation involving accountability at the M&CC.

“I am deeply troubled about what is going on at City Hall regarding the lack of accountability and transparency as it relates to the City’s finances, with billions of dollars of taxpayers’ money being spent without any credible financial reports or audits performed for the money spent, as required by the Municipal & District Councils Act, Chapter 28:01, Sect 177.”
The Georgetown City Council has recently promised to have improved services and facilities, better markets, efficient management of the City’s affairs; and, more importantly, transparency and accountability for taxpayers’ money. However, Kuppen said that there is a perception that corruption is rampant at City Hall, and this perception is fueled by the lack of accountability for hundreds of millions of dollars spent on projects such as the Stabroek Market clean-up and the Merriman’s Mall rehabilitation project.

“I have consistently called for a forensic audit to be conducted on the City of Georgetown’s finances. And, I am not the only one who has been calling for this forensic audit. When any new Council takes over, it should be presented with an audited financial statement of the Council’s finances from the Auditor General as soon as possible,” Kuppen said, but noted that this did not happen.

He said several attempts were made to move a motion for a forensic audit to be done at the M&CC, and several written requests were submitted to the Mayor and the Town Clerk to have the motions included on the agenda for the statutory meeting held every Monday.

However, it has been alleged that Town Clerk Royston King responded saying that the motions were faulty, but did not advise what those deficiencies were.